Catherine Carrigan - The Little Book of Breathwork

The Little Book

of Breathwork

Catherine Carrigan

Copyright 2019 by Catherine Carrigan

All rights reserved.

Book design by RamaJon

Cover design by RamaJon

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

Available for order through Ingram Press Catalogues

Catherine Carrigan

Visit my websites at

www.catherinecarrigan.com www.unlimitedenergynow.com

Printed in the United States of America

First Printing: April 2019

ISBN: 978-0-9894506-4-5

BOOK I

How I Learned to Breathe Properly

Chapter 1:

My History of Asthma

As long as there is breath in the body, there is life. When breath departs, so does life. Therefore, regulate the breath.

- Nath Yogi Swatmarama

When I was about 30 years old, I noticed I would get out of breath walking across a flat parking lot.

I went to a medical doctor who diagnosed me with asthma. At the time, he also tested me for environmental allergies.

Im going to put you in my allergy hall of fame, the doctor told me.

Apparently, I was allergic -- and not just mildly allergic, but highly reactive -- to every substance he tested me for.

And so began my history of having trouble breathing, using various inhalers as I wheezed and going to the doctor twice a week to receive a series of allergy shots.

I didnt like the inhalers because they made

me feel like not just any old space cadet but a super-spacey space cadet.

Nevertheless, I also didnt like not being able to take a full breath, so I did as I was told.

About the same time, being a reasonable person, I decided for myself that maybe it would be a good idea to start exercising.

Nobody told me to exercise. I just figured it out for myself.

Look at it this way: If I had an asthma attack with my reduced lung capacity, becoming more physically fit meant that maybe, just maybe, my breathing difficulties wouldnt be so scary.

So I joined the local YMCA. I attended aerobics classes, had a little card that allowed me to work the weight machines in the gym and sometimes went swimming after work.

Eventually I disliked the inhalers so much that I simply stopped using them.

I kept having to get allergy shots for a period of about five years.

As I became more fit, I felt better and better about myself even though nobody was teaching me how to breathe properly and I still struggled sometimes.

Three Part Breathing

Chapter 2:

Learning to Breathe

Now is where love breathes.

• Rumi

One year when I was still in my early 30s, I went on vacation to Los Angeles. As was and still is my custom, I had come to enjoy taking long walks.

While on vacation, I kept wandering around the city one day until I eventually ended up in front of a yoga studio. A few years earlier, a friend had recommended I take up yoga, but I recall arrogantly replying, Yoga is for wimps, and quickly dismissed him.

Since I was going to be in L.A. and away from work for more than a week, however, I decided I might as well give this thing a try.

I dont remember much about those first yoga classes other than I felt really good while practicing. There was no huffing and puffing like in the aerobics classes at the YMCA and no straining as there had been in the weight room.

I noticed I could breathe better during the yoga classes than in the highly chlorinated swimming pool. At the time, I didnt think the classes were easy, but then again I really didnt know what I was doing.

At the end of the week, I noticed the studio was selling a videotape for about $10 and decided to make the small investment so I could continue to practice back home in Atlanta.

Little did I realize my entire life was about to change.

I started practicing yoga without a mat on the thick red rug in my living room. Slipping around, I followed the videotaped instruct-tions. I still didnt exactly know what I was doing, but it felt so good I practiced every day for a month.

Although I was just practicing sun salutes, a few standing poses and some backbends, my entire view of spirituality suddenly began to shift.

The church I had patronized no longer felt right for me. Its doctrines rang a little harsh, so I stopped attending.

I cant explain what it was about the yoga exercises on the videotape that changed my viewpoint. All I knew was that the practice gave me a connection to my own soul that I had never experienced before.

I still attend church, but have found a new place to worship that feels kinder and gentler.

At the beginning of the videotape, the beautiful woman instructing the yoga practice guided me to put my hands on my belly to feel myself breathe.

I learned three-part breathing.

You breathe into your belly. Then you keep one hand on your belly and move the other hand to your chest.

Then you move the lower hand up to your ribs and feel them expanding.

You learn to feel yourself breathing three-dimensionally.

For the first time in my life, I became aware of myself breathing.

Even the experience of asthma with all its

restrictions, inhalers and discomfort hadnt connected me back to my breath.

At the end of the video, I was instructed to lie down and relax for five minutes.

That for me was the hardest part of the practice -- lying still and trying to quiet my mind.

Even though I didnt know what I was doing after a month of trying, I felt calmer, more relaxed and happier with myself.

A few months later, I purchased my first yoga mat, and lo and behold, my feet stopped slipping around!

The word asana used in yoga translates to steady and relaxed position. Finally, I was firmly on my feet as I practiced the poses.

I wasnt accustomed to spending money on myself -- first a $10 video and then an actual yoga mat -- so this venture was turning into a major investment.

I had embarked on a journey that to this day still takes me deeper into the steadiest part of myself and makes me aware that I am worth

taking care of.

Chapter 3:

Relaxing in a Mental Hospital

Breathe, darling. This is just a chapter.

Its not your whole story.

• S.C. Lourie

Before I was diagnosed with asthma at age 30, I had another brief experience with breathwork although it wasnt described in those terms at the time.

When I was about 20 years old, I suffered a nervous breakdown and was thrown into a mental hospital.

Theres not much I can recommend about the experience other than, if it ever happens to you even once, you will resolve to do whatever it takes never to end up in such a place ever again.

At the mental hospital, we had individual and group therapy, and I was prescribed a series of pills.

I felt like an awful person and worried that if I were actually crazy, which is the label they had put on me, then no one might ever love

me.

When the doctors finally determined it was safe to let me stroll around the grounds, I took walks in the fresh air whenever possible.

Periodically, our little group got herded into a separate building where we took classes on stress management.

My one positive memory of the place -- aside from the walking -- was lying on the floor of the mental hospital breathing.